Photographer Rich Clarkson Has Covered the Final Four for 60 Straight Years
The two “Final Four” basketball games of the 2015 men’s NCAA basketball tournament were held yesterday. One of the photographers sitting on the sideline was 82-year-old Rich Clarkson, a man who has been photographing the tournament for 60 straight years. The video above is a 5-minute segment CBS recently aired that looks into Clarkson’s life and work as he “hangs up his camera” after this year’s tournament.
Some interesting facts about Clarkson’s career: he first covered the NCAA championship when he was just 20 years old in 1952. He has photographed a Rose Bowl, a World Series, four Super Bowls, and six Olympics. He photographed the first all-black starting lineup in an NCAA final. The first photo he sold to Sports Illustrated was a shot of NBA legend Wilt Chamberlain while he was in college. His first shots sold for 75 cents each, and his latest photos these days sell for $5,000 a pop.
